


Let It Go

by chiswickflo



Category: Son of Rambow (2007)
Genre: Gen, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-12-20
Updated: 2014-12-20
Packaged: 2018-03-02 11:58:33
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,906
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2811173
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/chiswickflo/pseuds/chiswickflo
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Carter and Proudfoot Presents... Again.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Let It Go

**Author's Note:**

  * For [morganmuffle](https://archiveofourown.org/users/morganmuffle/gifts).



 

> EXT. CHURCH - DAY
> 
>   
>  A TYPICAL MAIN STREET IN SMALLTOWN AMERICA. A CHURCH WITH ITS DOORS OPEN AND BELL RINGING. AN OLD PRIEST IS GREETING PEOPLE AS THEY GO INTO THE CHURCH.
> 
>   
>  CUT TO: OLD PRIEST IN FRONT OF ALTAR
> 
>   
>  PRIEST: THE LORD BE WITH YOU.
> 
> CUT TO: WIDE SHOT OF CONGREGATION.
> 
>   
>  PEOPLE: AND ALSO WITH YOU.
> 
> CUT TO: PRIEST AGAIN
> 
>   
>  PRIEST: LET US SING HYMN NUMBER-
> 
>   
>  CUT TO: CEILING EXPLODING INWARDS SUDDENLY AND COMMANDOES RAPPELING INTO THE NOW DEVASTATED CHURCH FROM A HELICOPTER!
> 
>   
>  HEAD COMMANDO: FORGIVE US, FATHER, FOR WE ARE ABOUT TO SIN!
> 
>   
>  PRIEST: MY SON, WHAT ARE YOU DOING? THIS IS A HOUSE OF FUCKSHITBUGGERYBUGGERY-

  
‘-And bollocks,’ says Lee, and rips the sheet of paper out of the word processor, crumples it into a ball, and flings it across the shop. It richochets off the spinner rack of Family Films, and into the bargain bin coming to rest against Steven Seagal's stern, tanned face.

  
‘You better not be typing up your shitty films on my fucking office technology,’ says Lawrence as he shoulders his way into the shop, grunting under the weight of a box of knock-off video nasties. They’ve been doing a roaring trade with the Sixth Form up at St John’s who have been running a double bill of _The Werewolf and the Yeti_ and _Bambi Goes Crazy-Ape Bonkers with Drill and Set_ as part of their supposed Film Club Nights. ‘I’m running a bona fide business here and I don’t need any of your Junior Spielberg shit cluttering up the back of Mr Edmonds’ invoice for that overdue copy of _Debbie Does Dover_.’

  
'He’s had that video for five months,' says Lee. 'Ten to one, he’s snapped it with over-use.'

  
'And the video’s probably broke too,' says Lawrence. 'Fnar, fnar. Anyway, what are you doing fiddling about with your _Die Hard_ knock-offs while you’re at work? I’m not paying you to sit around pretending you’re John McCain.'

  
'It’s Mc _Clane_ ,' hisses Lee. 'John McClane. And you don’t even pay me for this!'

  
'Weeeell,' his brother says, consideringly, 'I’m doing the community a favour, innit? Keeping the local youth off the streets and out of trouble.'

  
'Look around you, Lawrence,' Lee says and throws his arms out to embrace the empty shop. 'Does anyone here look grateful for your efforts as a pillar of the community? No, and I’ll tell you for why: because it is summer in the English town that time forgot and the World Cup is on, and no-one is watching videos. No. One. There have been no customers in here in two days, and I am wasting my vital youthful days, Lawrence, my sap, my joie de vivre, in a poxy video shop, re-watching _1990: The Bronx Warriors_ , which is,' says Lee, moved by the spirit of fairness, 'entertainingly fucking appalling, but the fact remains that nobody is going to come through that door for at least three more weeks.'

  
The little bell above the door in question tinkles like a merry, hellish little giggle, as someone in an anorak pushes it open and sings out, 'Hello, Lee Carter.'

'Fucking hell, Proudfoot,' says Lawrence, 'your timing remains im-fucking-peccable.'

  
'Thank you!' says Will, proudly, in all his wispy, otherworldly glory, completely unaware of Lawrence’s amusement. Lee groans and drops his head onto the counter with a resounding thud. It’s only partially to disguise the way he hasn’t been able to stop smiling since he first recognised Will’s stupid, big-eyed face peering through the door.

 

'So,' he says, awkwardly, half an hour later, as he sets a pint of lemonade down on the beer garden table in front of Will. 'How’s university?'

  
Will beams at him and wraps his hands round the glass. His wrists still look as thin and hollow as birds’ bones, Lee notices distantly, as they stick out from his anorak sleeves.

  
'It’s fun!' he says, earnestly. 'We watch a lot of films.'

  
'Well, you’re doing Film Studies,' says Lee. 'So that works out.'

  
'Yes,' agrees Will, sipping his drink, as horrifyingly oblivious to sarcasm as ever. It must be a religion thing, Lee supposes, what with the Brethren upbringing and all the Bible stuff. Then again, Father Shaughnessy down at the church has never failed to give him a clip round the ear when he thought Lee was giving him lip, so maybe it’s just a Will thing.

  
'Are they good films then?' he says and braces himself to take a gulp of his lager. He doesn’t really like the taste but everyone else seems to drink it, and he’s pretty sure that if he keeps trying, it’ll somehow make sense. Lager, he decided, two years ago, was a suitable drink for a Carter, so he saves his fondness for sweet drinks for Christmas and then goes up to the old folks’ home to drink Baileys with Frank. Well, they steal the nurses’ Baileys and Lee drinks most of it, but Frank enjoys the stealing more than the alcohol which he says has him ‘widdling like a broken sprinkler.’

  
'Well,' says Will, thoughtfully, 'it turns out that in Film Studies good doesn’t mean the same thing. The lecturers spend an awful lot of time talking about canon and cultural value and things like that, and not an awful lot of time talking about films that people like.'

  
'Well, Cannon made in _Missing In Action_ ,' says Lee fairly. 'And _Death Wish 4_. And _I_ liked them.'

  
'No, canon is like films that universities think are good. Some of the films don’t even have any explosions in them!'

  
'What do you mean?' says Lee, with a horrible sense of foreboding as Will peers suspiciously up at a cloudless, blue sky before wrestling free of the anorak. He keeps it protectively close though, in case the weather betrays him. He really is still built like a twig, marvels Lee, but there are more important things to consider. 'Are you- Will, have you been watching- French films?'

  
It turns out that Will _has_ been watching French films. And British films and German films and classical Hollywood films and even Russian films. Lee didn’t even know Russia made films; what’s exciting about Communism?

  
‘They are all really interesting, Lee Carter,’ announces Will, his eyes bright with evangelical zeal and an incipient sugar rush, and then hesitates. 'Only-'

  
'Only-?' prompts Lee, guiltily pleased that there is something that isn’t perfect about Will’s exciting new life at university. He’s never wanted to go himself but most of his year at school had been offered places at university, a fact proudly trumpeted by _The Leadbrook Gazette_ , and, even if most of them had still hated him, the town had felt like a ghost town after they’d all buggered off. Left alone with the remaining Leadbrook populace, a little, local club of middle-aged, middle-class professionals who have always regarded the Carters with narrow-eyed suspicion, he'd fallen into minding the video shop for Lawrence until he could figure out how to get his films seen on a platform larger than a BBC kids' programme. He'd never admit it to anyone, but the village had been pretty lonely without Will or any of the others; at least, until Dunc Miller had dropped out of his Modern Languages degree at Newcastle, stating that he was 'bloody sick of French and everything that comes with it.' Perhaps Dunc is finally recovering from the trauma of the school exchange trip.

  
'Weeeeell,' says Will eventually, looking guilty himself, 'I think I might be in trouble with my lecturers.'

  
'Well, it's higher education, not St John's High School; they’re probably not going to torture you,' Lee says, dryly, and takes another determined sip of lager.

  
Will grins at him, shyly, and says, 'Don't worry, I'm trained to ignore pain and live off the land.'

  
Snorting into his glass, Lee says, 'All right, Son of Rambow, what did you do that’s so terrible?'

  
Apparently, Will’s been learning about this thing called otourism, which means that the film director is the only person that really makes the film. This sounds like a load of bollocks to Lee; he himself has a grip of iron and balls of steel and look what fucking happened to his debut film: unwanted Frenchmen, ninjas and girls all over the shop. But Will has wound himself up about this essay which had to talk about an otour and which he thinks he’s messed up because he talked about-

  
‘Sylvester Stallone?’ Lee says. ‘Bloody brilliant, Will. That is fucking genius.’

  
Will looks a little appeased but he keeps gnawing on his lip as he says, ‘But Sylvester Stallone wasn't mentioned in the canon, just people like Hitchcock and Renoir, so I think I might have messed it up.’

  
'Listen, mate,' Lee says, 'I firmly believe that Sly is one of the great and unrecognised cinematic geniuses of our time.'

  
'Me too,' says Will, excitedly. 'He does acting and writing and directing, and he’s been nominated for lots of Oscars, so maybe he’s a secret part of the canon?' He scrunches up his forehead over his massive, weirdly blue eyes, looking, Lee thinks fondly, like a puzzled Pekinese.

  
'Sylvester Stallone _is_ the canon,' says Lee, and Will grins at him and draws a finger absently through some of the lemonade he’s spilled onto the weathered wood of the table. The resultant scribble dries quickly in the sweltering June heat that has swallowed up Leadbrook and the surrounding fields and woodlands in a syrupy lassitude for weeks, but it looks like a flying dog.

  
'What have you been up to, then?' Will asks with interest, and before Lee can stop him he filches his lager and tips half of it into the beer garden hedgerow.

  
Lee gets several mangled syllables into a protest when he realises that Will is carefully pouring half of his own lemonade into the lager glass. ‘Oh,’ he says, dumbfounded, and covers his confusion by taking a sip of his doctored pint. _Oh._ That’s much better.

  
'You’re welcome,' Will says smugly. 'So you were going to tell me what you’ve been doing?'

  
'Uh,' says Lee, guiltily, and buries his face in his pint again. 'AhvbnmakinuhflmwthDncan.'

  
'Sorry?'

  
Lee takes a breath and enunciates clearly, 'I’ve been making a film with Duncan Miller.'

  
'Oh,' says Will, clearly thrown. 'Well, that's good. Duncan Miller. Of course. It's just that we've always made our films over the summer and I thought- Well, never mind. What’s it about?'

  
Lee winces pre-emptively.

  
Will takes it very well. By which, Lee means that Will keeps bravely saying it’s fine, and of course they should remake _Son of Rambow_ , possibly just so they can get the spelling on the credits right this time, but of course effects have improved immeasurably in seven years, and with the advances in non-linear video editing, they won't have to cut their film with a razor blade and Sellotape- He even goes so far as to say, with genuine sincerity, that he’d love to see their rushes, and Lee recklessly promises to let him see their work so far, if only to alleviate the crushing guilt that he and Dunc have basically hijacked Will’s original story and drawings of death-defying stunts, evil scarecrows and flying dogs in order to pass the time while they figure out what they want to do with their lives. He keeps apologising and Will keeps saying it’s fine but something feels off between them now, and Lee slopes off home from the pub a little bit earlier than he’d planned, claiming that Lawrence needs him to stocktake the Erotic Thriller section. His blatant lie makes Will blush and stutter but does at least mean that he doesn’t object to Lee's early departure or ask any more excruciating questions about a film that should, by rights, be his.

 

 

> EXT. JUNGLE CAMP - DAY
> 
> A SMALL FIRE IN THE MIDDLE OF A CLEARING: SEVERAL HEAVILY ARMED MEN PATROL THE PERIMETER WHILE SON OF RAMBOW AND COLONEL TRAUTMAN SIT BY THE FIRE.
> 
> CUT TO: CLOSE UP OF AN EMOTIONAL SON OF RAMBOW
> 
> SON OF RAMBOW: YOU BETRAYED ME, TRAUTMAN! YOU KNEW THAT CHURCH IN SMALLTOWN AMERICA WAS RIGGED TO BLOW!
> 
> TRAUTMAN: I SWEAR TO YOU, SON OF RAMBOW, I THOUGHT YOU WERE LONG GONE. I DIDN'T KNOW YOU WERE IN DANGER.
> 
> SON OF RAMBOW: BULLSHIT, TRAUTMAN! I HAD TO FIGHT MY WAY THROUGH A SQUAD OF BLOODCRAZED COMMANDOES AND A MERCENARY DISGUISED AS A PRIEST. I WAS WOUNDED!
> 
> TRAUTMAN: SO WAS I, SON OF RAMBOW! EMOTIONALLY! WHEN I THOUGHT YOU WERE DEAD, I WAS Dear Mr Edmonds,
> 
> Please find enclosed an invoice for the hire of the video _Debbie Does Dover_ , which is now six months overdue and has accrued a significant fine. We would ask that you contact us at Carter Videos to arrange payment of the fine or a replacement fee.
> 
>  

Will's return to Leadbrook can hardly be called a triumphant return: he doesn't go on a pub crawl round all three of the town's pubs before accidentally exposing himself to a Women's Institute meeting like Shaun, or get into a catfight in the Post Office over the last padded envelope (and an ex-boyfriend) like Tina and Gail. He spends most of his time with his Mum and sister, and Lee doesn't want to intrude. Plus, while Mrs Proudfoot has always been perfectly pleasant to him, she still scares the widdle out of Lee. Even Lawrence is very careful around her, although Lee has always harboured a deep suspicion that his brother's uncharacteristic cautious courtesy towards Will's mum is partially down to the fact that he fancies her. He hasn't said anything about it to Lawrence because he's not stupid, and also ugh.

The few days of respite give him room to talk to Dunc, though, and make sure that he's okay with Will coming along to film with them. Given the circumstances, Duncan can hardly object but he is reluctant to embroil himself past saying hello to Will.

'And I know _Son of Rambow_ was his idea but we've done all the pre-production, right? And I'm the one who's been in negotiation with that actor, who was in _Casualty_.'

'I know that, Dunc,' Lee says, as patiently as he can manage, which is to say, not very patiently at all. 'Your casting credentials are not in doubt here.'

'But does he know that?' Dunc asks. 'Because it's still you and me, right? Carter and Miller Presents... No Proudfoot this time round.'

'Will's not involved in the production,' soothes Lee. 'He'll get a mention in the credits: based on an idea by, etc., but no more than that. He knows that. He's fine with that!'

'Okay,' says Dun, looking slightly less ruffled. 'Okay, then.'

'But are we completely sure about Carter and Miller Presents...?' says Lee. 'It sounds like we're filming in Trumpton. No? Okay,' he says, hurriedly, as Duncan starts to go an ugly puce again. 'It's growing on me the more I say it: Carter and Miller, Carter and Miller- No, I love it now.'

It's still a little tense when Will turns up for their shoot at the school, and everything goes promptly further downhill when Will looks around the colonnade and the tripod, and says dubiously, 'Do you have filming permission for this?'

God knows Will has been Lee's best mate since they were twelve, and he will not deny that he has missed him since Will left for London, but he has to roll his eyes extravagantly at this, as does Dunc.

Will bridles a little when he sees this, and says, 'I suppose the Health and Safety check hasn't been done either, then?'

Dunc looks honestly bewildered. 'Why the hell would we need a Health and Safety check?'

'It's common procedure among _real_ filmmakers,' Will says, snottily. 'And it stops people from leaving other people drowning in an unexpected oil sump when there's an accident during filming. For example.'

Purple, it turns out, is not a colour that goes well with ginger hair. Dunc's face is so horribly congested with shame and anger that Lee thinks his head might pop, but he's not sure he's that far behind him.

'Are you saying we're not real filmmakers?' he hears himself say. Even to himself, his voice is flat.

'That's not what I was saying, Lee Carter,' Will protests, blushing himself. 'I just think it's important to be familiar with your filming environment.'

'We went to school here for seven years, Proudfoot,' Lee says, cracking the words out like shots. 'I think we've developed enough familiarity with it. Listen, I know _Son of Rambow_ was your idea when we made the first one, but you said you were okay with this. You said you didn't want to interfere. You said you would just watch us filming.'

'Yes,' says Will, subdued. 'I did say that.' He takes a deep breath and steps back beyond the sightline of the camera, and says, earnestly, 'I am sorry, Duncan. That was a mean thing to say.'

'That's okay,' says Dunc, blinking. Stunned, Lee thinks wryly, into speechlessness by the terrifying genuineness that Will seems unafraid to show the world; he knows the feeling.

But despite the seeming rapprochement, the shoot remains tense. Lee doesn't know what it is, precisely. Both Duncan and Will are scrupulously polite to each other, Dunc focusing on the practicalities of light levels, camera angles and shot length, and Will remaining quiet beyond the filming cordon they've set up. It's not until they're running through the scene which introduces Trautman that it clicks: the way Will's face is carefully expressionless and the silence which is becoming oppressive; he doesn't think they're filmmakers, him and Dunc. He thinks they're messing about, that they're amateurs. He probably thinks this is funny.

The humiliation and anger builds so fast, so hot, so unexpectedly, that it only takes Will shifting from one foot to the next for Lee to round on him aggressively.

'What?'

'What what?' says Will, looking bewildered. 'I don't understand.'

'Neither do I!' barks Lee. 'I don't understand why you're even fucking here, for a start. You didn't want to get involved and you're clearly not happy with what we're doing, so why are you even here?'

'I'm not _not_ happy with what you're doing,' Will says, carefully. 'It's just- I didn't realise when we were first writing this that it's a bit- I mean, I've studied subtext and psychoanalytical criticism since then, and I suppose-'

'Oh, right,' says Lee, nodding furiously. 'Subtext. Psycho criticism. Well, we don't know anything about subtext or fancy university films here; we just want to make a film about guns and explosions and a close male friendship that people will actually like.'

'Mate,' says Dunc, cautiously, but Lee is on a roll now.

'Listen, you went off to university and didn't even call me, right? So you don't get to come back and make fun of our film, and look down on us when you just left! So why don't you just fuck off back to London with your fancy friends and your canon and your stupid bloody essays, and leave me alone!'

Will's face has gone red and white, and he looks broken open, the way Lee had once seen him in a hospital room in 1983. This time, Lee can't even blame the pain or the drugs, though, he thinks miserably, as Will nods jerkily and leaves.

He's disappeared past the school railings and down the road, when Dunc finally whistles and says, expressively, 'Fucking hell, mate.'

'I know,' says Lee. 'I know.'

 

> EXT. MOUNTAIN - DAWN
> 
> IN THE BACKGROUND, THERE IS SMOKE RISING FROM A MASSIVE EXPLOSION AND BOTH TRAUTMAN AND SON OF RAMBOW ARE CLUTCHING GUNS. BIG GUNS.
> 
> TRAUTMAN: I KNEW YOU'D COME BACK FOR ME, SON OF RAMBOW.
> 
> SON OF RAMBOW: I NEVER LEAVE A MAN BEHIND, COLONEL.
> 
> TRAUTMAN: I SHOULD NEVER HAVE DOUBTED YOU. YOU ARE A MAN OF INTEGRITY. YOU KNOW YOUR DUTY.
> 
> SON OF RAMBOW: IT WASN'T SIMPLY DUTY, COLONEL. YOU ARE MY BEST FRIEND; I'LL ALWAYS COME BACK ~~TO~~ FOR YO- OH FUCKING HELLFIRE.
> 
>  

  
Even the birds are still sleeping, with dawn a pale, steely threat on the horizon, when Lee decides that he knows what he has to do to make himself feel better, and he heads down to Fairley's supermarket while night still clings on stubbornly to the sky.

  
The management of Fairleys’ have regarded him with a suspicious eye ever since he stole that that Guide Dogs for the Blind collection box. For the seven years since, it's been chained to the supermarket doorframe. It's outrageous; is there no trust anymore? Fortunately, Lee has managed to acquire a pair of boltcutters which slice through the chain like butter.

Will's grandma died four years previously, so Lee doesn't have to be as worried about waking up his entire family but he's still terrified by the fair-faced, steely-eyed Mrs Proudfoot so he picks the smallest pebbles to hurl up at Will's window.

'You aren't Will,' Lee says, a minute later.

'Well spotted. Was it the boobs that gave it away?' says Will's sister caustically, yawning cavernously. Jess is getting very lippy in her old age, Lee notes disapprovingly.

'What boobs?' Lee lobs back. The day he is disconcerted by a sixteen year old girl who still has spot cream clinging to her jaw is the day he- does something that is completely unexpected. Oh, that will be the day indeed. 'It was the moustache that gave it away. Will can't grow one, you see. It's good to know that one of the Proudfoots can cultivate facial hair.'

She hisses and points at him threateningly, before disappearing back into the silent house.

Lee hops from foot to foot, debating whether or not to run. Jess might have gone to get her mum. But after a minute or two, Will emerges out of the front door, bleary-eyed and struggling into his anorak before he stops dead on the drive, even though he's barefoot and the gravel must be excruciating.

'Lee Carter,' he says, now awake and wide-eyed. 'Is that my flying dog?'

Lee looks up to where Goldie the Guide Dog is once more proudly flying the skies of Leadbrook.

'Well,' he says, shrugging awkwardly, 'it's not an apology, you should know that. Because I've got nothing to apologise for, right? But if you had been feeling bad about the film and Duncan Miller- Because we'll always have Carter and Proudfoot Presents..., you know.'

'I know,' says Will. 'And I maybe felt a _bit_ bad about you making films with Duncan, but I let that go. I let it go.' He looks up again, shading his eyes against the coming dawn. 'And you brought me a flying dog. Not including the bit where it's five to six in the morning, I think this might be my best day of all time.'

To say Lee is surprised by the hug is an understatement, but once Will has caught him in the surprisingly wiry grasp of his stick-thin arms, he's perfectly happy to settle into it, hiding his grin in Will's shoulder and not even making rude gestures at Jess when she pokes her head out of the bedroom window and snorts disparagingly down at them.

'Besides,' says Will, happily, 'we can make another film together. _Son of Rambow III_ , maybe.'

'Yeah,' says Lee, wryly. 'Yeah, okay, but I'm doing the spelling this time.'

**Author's Note:**

> Many thanks to my beta, who stepped up at the last moment and eradicated my comma splices and inappropriate semi-colons. With explosions and big guns.


End file.
